RULING MUMBAI PART III
This nativist-regionalist policy gradually flirts with the central government in the 1980s, creating an unprecedented symbiosis between regional demands and support for the nation-state in the wake of the Hindutva.
"We want a hindu nation in India" Rahul Thackeray, current Shiv Sena Chief Minister of Maharashtra
Gathering beyond caste: the power of religion
In his essay Saffronisation of Shiv Sena: political economy of city, state and nation , Jayant Lele accounts for this evolution by demonstrating the transfer of the status of the 'alien' of the Gujaratis, South Indians or communists to the Muslim community. Indeed, in parallel with the rise of the Hindu nationalist right wing BJP, the Shiv Sena adopts discourses and demands imbued with greater religiosity and fervor.
In the midst of the hegemony of Congress under Indira Gandhi, Shiv Sena uses heterogeneous and varied political alliances to maintain itself in opposition. For example, it won forty seats in the 1973 municipal elections in a coalition with the Republican Party, a party of Dalit leaders. His social base was broadened as a result, especially since the saffronisation of the party involved many religious celebrations, such as the maha aarti, which bring together Hindus beyond caste issues.
The religion and the attachment to the Hindutva also allows the Shiv Sena to gather behind the same banner all its supporters whose composition is a real panache.
From the working layers of the textile industry whose jobs had to be defended, to the Brahmin elites close to Thackeray and the central government, via the Bremans (petty bourgeois), all these castes/classes found an answer to the economic and social disarray of the 1980s through, once again, identity attachment: "the pan-national ideological cement of this alliance is ensured by the rise of Hindutva and Hindu nationalism "(1).
It should be noted that this period was marked by strong demographic growth in Mumbai, generated by a number of economic migrants who came to take advantage of the rise of capitalism in the city. This resulted in the emergence of two new characteristics of the city: the emergence of slums and the growth of parallel activity, which will constantly reinforce inequalities, the feeling of insecurity and injustice, as well as a modern form of anomie.
Saffronization of Shiv Sena : finding a commun enemy for Mumbai
This period is also marked by the 'rise of Islam' (at least presented as a 'new form of Islam' ) due to a wave of conversion of the Dalit populations which is leading to a revival of Hindu acts of faith.
The Shiv Sena then allied itself with the response campaigns of the Vishva Hindu Parishad (VHP, world Hindu council, a sort of moral authority and militia of the Sangh Parivar) which carried out major conversion operations and demonstrations of Hindu strength. The campaign slogan "Gauravse kaho hum Hindu hai" ("say with pride, I am Hindu") is taken up with great pomp in the party's speeches and leaflets as well as on the walls of the most traditional districts, like Dadar. The conversion of Shiv Sena to Hindutva takes a decisive turning point in 1984 when the party officially allied itself with the BJP and thus entered the Sangh Parivar. If at the beginning the very popular composition of the party led to the reticence of movements from the north of India (mostly Brahmins), Shiv Sena gradually made its mark by exploiting anti-Muslim rhetoric: Bal Thackeray's speeches then became very virulent in their attacks against Muslims, and instilled a wave of hatred and tension in the city, which was very reactive because of the large Muslim community it sheltered. The Shiv Sena uses its "exploits" outside the city (e.g. Bhivandi and Thane riots) of provoking riots in Muslim neighborhoods to preach violence in Mumbai. Although counter-intuitive, the rhetoric is well grounded in persuading Hindus that the legacy of non-violence has made Hindus vulnerable to Muslim aggression. This is again about creating and exploiting the sense of downgrading of Hindu populations.
Mumbai's setting confers very singular specificities to this emerging Hindutva, since the 1980s were characterized by the emergence of "predatory capitalism" in the city, leading to two types of positioning of Shiv Sena: on the one hand, the designation of Muslims as the leaders and beneficiaries of this phenomenon, which impoverished many middle class workers and white collars; on the other hand, the (secret) protection of the Hindu elites who enjoyed it through the party's surveillance and control network (we will return below to the link between the emergence of Shiv Sena, the mafia milieu and illicit activity).
This strategy proves to be fruitful since it brings the party in power to the 1985 municipal elections, giving it a monopoly on the mayor's office, the BMC (Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation) and their ancillary institutions.
The Babri Masjid case : when Mumbai entered communal conflicts
The construction of a nationalist identity by Shiv Sena reached its peak in 1992-1993 around the issue of the Babri Masjid (Babri's Mosque). Accused of occupying Rama's birthplace, this mosque was destroyed by Hindu militants (the majority coming from the RSS, the armed militia of Sangh Parivar) on 6 December 1992. If this act of vandalism is largely attributable to the speeches of the BJP and the RSS, the ensuing riots in the city of Mumbai are strongly linked to the Shiv Sena.
Babri Masjid assault on 6th December 1992
In fact, the escalation of violence in Ayodhya has repercussions on the city. The first wave of violence occurred on 7 December in Dongri, a Muslim neighbourhood in the south of the city where Muslim fanatics attacked Hindus (six of them were burned alive). The Shiv Sena prepares the revenge from 8 December until the end of January 1993. In total, nearly a thousand Mumbaikars died in these clashes, and an uncertain number of houses were burnt. Apart from the question of violence and responsibility of the Shiv Sena, to which we shall return, this event interests us here in that it acts as a radical rupture in the composition and identity of the city, which emerges deeply marked communally. This period saw a rise in identity consciousness on both sides, as witnessed by the press and leaflets of the time: for example, a pamphlet in Urdu language was widely distributed in the majority of the Muslim neighborhoods in the south of the city on 25 December 1992, calling on the Muslims to take up arms. The Shiv Sena responded to this by publishing an article in the Saamna (the party's official newspaper) which challenged the Hindus on 1st January 1993 with the injunction "Hindunni Akramat Vhayala Have" ("Hindus must become aggressive now").
If these fights, now considered as anti-Muslim pogroms by some, marked the definitive entry of Mumbai into the communal conflict, they completed the crowning of Shiv Sena in the eyes of the Hindus and the nationalist parties of North India, notably allowing it to take the leadership of Maharashtra in 1995 in coalition with the BJP.
Mumbai : the political laboratory
Mumbai plays a privileged and singular role in this ideological strategy. Indeed, if the Shiv Sena seeks to export itself on a national scale, it remains deeply attached to Mumbai, its headquarters and its ideological lung.
This leads to an unprecedented combination of nativism, regionalism and nationalism of which the city is a real laboratory.
This is illustrated for example in the Shiv Sena's fight to rename the city. Until then called Bombay, a name inherited from the Portuguese and then English colonial period, it was made Mumbai in 1995 to break with the colonial legacy and colour the city with its Marathi and Hindu identity.
The name comes from the contraction of "Mamba" or "Maha-Amba", the name of the goddess Mumbadevi, protector of the city's fishing communities, and "Aai" meaning "mother" in Marathi. Arjun Appadurai analyses this change as a demonstration of the strength of the Marathi identity, which asserts itself through its authenticity in a context of demographic and economic expansion of the city: "the transformation of Bombay into Mumbai is part of the paradoxical utopia in which ethnic cleansing of the city does not prevent an opening up to the world " (2)
This particular insertion into the world of the city under the action of the Shiv Sena remains a constant that can still be found today. Despite a period of opposition in the 2000s, Shiv Sena is still today at the head of Maharashtra and the municipality of Mumbai. If the last federal elections led him to ally himself with the Congress against the BJP for purely electoral reasons, Shiv Sena is a pillar in the promotion of Hindutva and local pride, which perfectly illustrates the idea of different "sons of the soil" all coming from the same "Bharat Mata" (mother India).
(1) "Saffronisation of Shiv Sena: Political economy of city, state and nation" Jayant Lele, Economic and Political Weekly, Vol. 30, N°25, June 1995
(2) “Spectral Housing and Urban cleansing : notes on millennial Mumbai”, Arjun Appadurai, Public culture, Duke university press, 2000